The Practice, Purpose and Possibilities of Care Proceedings involving Infants : A Bourdieusian Exploration

Brown, Rebecca and Broadhurst, Karen (2025) The Practice, Purpose and Possibilities of Care Proceedings involving Infants : A Bourdieusian Exploration. PhD thesis, Lancaster University.

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Abstract

This thesis critically examines the practice, purpose, and possibilities of care proceedings involving infants in England and Wales. Against a backdrop of rising newborn removals and persistent concerns about fairness and proportionality, the study interrogates how decisions are made within the family justice system and how power, hierarchy, and institutional norms shape outcomes for infants and their families. The research draws on non-participant observations of 17 infant care proceedings and semi-structured interviews with 16 professionals working in the field. The study is grounded in a critical realist paradigm and employs thematic analysis, using Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus, field, capital, doxa, and symbolic violence to explore how risk is constructed, how parental compliance is interpreted, and how expedient outcomes are justified. The findings reveal that care proceedings are not neutral or objective processes but are deeply shaped by social and institutional logics. Professional judgments are often guided by taken-for-granted assumptions about parenting, risk, and compliance, which disproportionately disadvantage socioeconomically marginalised families. The courtroom emerges as a hierarchical field in which symbolic capital determines whose voices are heard and whose are silenced. Social workers, despite their central role, are frequently devalued, while judges and guardians hold significant symbolic authority. Parents, particularly mothers, are often positioned as risky or non-compliant, with limited opportunity to challenge dominant narratives. This thesis contributes to the field by offering rare observational insight into the lived dynamics of infant care proceedings and by applying Bourdieu’s theory to expose the structural reproduction of inequality within the family courts. It advocates for a more reflective, compassionate, and relationally sensitive approach to infant protection, which acknowledges the structural conditions influencing family life and aims to support, rather than monitor, those who are at risk.